The Worst Advice for Bloggers

There are tons of websites and other bloggers sharing their best blogging advice and tips, but not all of the advice should be followed. For this post I wanted to share what I thought was the worst advice for bloggers and then ask fellow bloggers what bad advice they received.

Have a Single Niche

Many websites and even bloggers recommend starting a blog with a single niche, but I disagree. It is good to have an idea of what topic you would like to blog about, but when I started my blog I only posted about beauty and it got boring very quick. I then took a step back and realized that I should be able to blog about whatever I want since it is my blog, and now I blog about beauty, books, and lifestyle, and I am much more happier. You should not restrict yourself to a single niche because no one likes only one thing so why should your blog only focus on one thing?

Upgrade to a Paid Plan or Go Self-Hosted IMMEDIATELY

If you are a new blogger, I do not recommend upgrading to a paid WordPress plan because most bloggers quit blogging within a few months. If life gets in the way or you realize blogging is not for you, you spent $60 that you cannot get back (the WordPress plans are billed yearly instead of monthly). The same goes for going self-hosted. Yes you can do many things that you cannot with a free plan like using Google Analytics, Google Ads, and other plugins, but it requires much more work that I do not recommend for new bloggers. If however you have been blogging for a good amount of time and you would like to take your blog further, then I would highly recommend purchasing your own domain and possibly upgrading to a paid plan.

Blog Every Day

First off I admire anyone who has the time to blog every day, but most bloggers will not have the time especially if they have a job, school, or family. It is definitely not necessary to blog every day, and as I mentioned in my What I Learned in 2 Years of Blogging post, quality is much more important than quantity, and it is better to publish one high quality post a week than short blog posts every day.

Write Short Posts vs Long Posts

I have read advice about writing posts under 300 words to immediately get your point across and I have also read posts about writing 1,500 words to have better SEO, but the length of your post does not matter as much as the content. On some days my posts will be around 300 words while others may be closer to 1,000. I do not think you should focus on the word count and instead focus on the quality like I mentioned in the previous point.

Have Every Social Media Account

I brought this point up in my Social Media Accounts: How Many is Too Many for a Blogger? post, and it is really not necessary to have every social media account. I highly advise against a Facebook page since they are very slow to grow and Facebook charges you to share your posts to your audience, but I do recommend joining Facebook groups like Starlight Bloggers Group. Twitter is hands down my favorite social media platform since I can share my blog posts, pictures, and random statuses. Instagram is meh because I hate the follow to unfollow game, but I like looking at everyone’s pictures. I have not ventured into utilizing Pinterest, but I have heard many great things. So I would ignore the advice of having every social account and focus on 1-3 platforms instead.

I asked bloggers on Twitter what bad advice they came across and this what they had to say!

Tinka a lifestyle blogger from LittleTinkableewrote “To focus on your viewers first. Obviously I never listened, I want people to come to my blog because they want to not because I’ve basically baited them into it.” Lisa a food and travel blogger from Italian Kiwi added to Tinka’s comment and said “Yes, that’s what I was told too. “If youwrite good content, people will come.” I’ve discovered that good content is definitely not the main factor.”

Siobhan a fan art blogger from Life of Siobhan wrote “A friend once told me to buy 5k followers off eBay and set my self up. Apparently that helps me skip the grafting part of building a community of readers.”

Kerry a life and travel blogger from Kerry life and loves said “I have been told by blogging “experts” that you MUST have a niche. While I do understand the benefit of having a niche, I think it took away my enjoyment of blogging when I tried to restrict my content, so I went back to just doing what I like. It was more important to me to just enjoy blogging. I was also told that you had to be very active on Instagram to grow your blog. My blog has 5 times the amount of views that my social accounts has followers so that defo wasn’t true!”

Chloe a mental health and lifestyle blogger from Chloe Chats said “When I first started to blog I used to read that other bloggers would say you need to be active on every single social media to get your blog out there and attract readers – but I’ve done pretty well with just using a select few, and even if I have loads of different social media platforms I only really use Twitter the most!”

Nick an entrepreneurial blogger from Nine-Five to Freedom wrote “I think the worst advice I ever got, was to post, post, post. Although I think writing constantly and consistently is great for honing your writing skills and posting consistently is important for creating a following, I only want to share great content. Posting content for the sake of posting content is going to hurt your blog and your brand. You will quickly lose followers if 1 out of every 10 posts is actually quality and worth reading.”

Raheela a mommy business blogger fromMommy’s Business 101said “You need to have 500 posts. Just copy and paste.”

Melina a beauty, books, travel, and lifestyle blogger from Melina Elisawrote “I think one piece of bad advice is to follow every single person on twitter, definitely follow people you like and want to see more of. Another thing is to make sure to not to start off blogging, and make a post every single day. It’s so easy when you start to post often when you’re full of ideas, but it’s also very easy to get burnt out quickly that way!”

Christina a college lifestyle blogger from Christina Bee said “Some bad advice I’ve seen is to buy a ton of ebooks and workshops. I think there are some beneficial ones out there especially if the blogger knows exactly what workshop they want and have done the research or their friend did it and they saw the benefits first hand. Workshops can be helpful, but too many is almost information overload.”

Mackenzie a food, travel, and lifestyle blogger from Mack Marie said “So this may be controversial but I think the advice that you should blog according to certain rules like length/ type/ schedule can be limiting. Creativity is so important and remembering your piece of the web is YOURS is so important- sometimes ignoring the “rules” is good and actually important.”

James a book blogger fromThis Is My Truth Now wrote “I think the bad advice I heard was follow everyone back. I’d say it a bit differently. Follow back those you find interesting and match your interests. You might end up with too much in your feed to really connect with bloggers who resonate with your own voice.”

Thank you to everyone who contributed to this post! I hope with this post you will realize that even if blogging experts are sharing a piece of advice, it may not always be the best and you should take it with a grain of a salt.

Published by Karalee

Post navigation

86 thoughts on “The Worst Advice for Bloggers”

Well said 👏
About the whole ‘post everyday’ thing was bothering me today. I know what works well for me… Blogging isn’t exactly the same as other social media. So I wish people wouldn’t give such advice that makes people feel anxious despite all there efforts.

I loved reading this, and yes I’ve heard a fair few of them myself. I particularly love the advice of not necessarily upgrading to a paid wordpress, as I’m on a free one, and yes I can’t monetize it, but could I really when my blog is predominantly a health blog. I don’t think it’s worth the leap. If wordpress or hosters let you pay monthly I would, but a year upfront, no thanks x

I think you can monetize any blog, but the money you get really depends on how many visitors you have.
I agree it would be better if you could pay for plans monthly since it is a large amount to pay all at once!

I completely agree with you, I HATE when people say you can only have one specific niche or you have to do this and that. At the end of the day it’s YOUR blog so why should anyone else decide what goes into it?

The whole niche thing is in all the social media influencer tips, even on YouTube. I believe it does help but it’s not something that will eliminate you from being successful if you decide to have variety content. I personally could not stick to one topic. Creativity should not be limited.

Thanks for including me in your blog post. There are so many things to look out for, it’s really useful. I definitely agree with setting up all your social at once. It’s overwhelming. If I could do it again I would set up maximum two social media accounts at once

You’re welcome!
I’ve had a personal Twitter & Instagram account years before I started my blog, so it wasn’t that hard learning how to use it for my blog, but when I started using Pinterest, Bloglovin & every other social media platform, it got overwhelming!

I used to get criticized too for writing bad reviews, but then I realize how will people know to maybe skip out on that product or book?! For a while I wasn’t writing bad book reviews, but I decided that it was my blog, and I was going to write what I want to. The good and the bad! x

I cannot believe people get criticised for writing bad reviews. This was your opinion, even though negative and you have freedom of expression. People who criticised your negative reviews do not respect you or your rights/opinions. I love reading bad reviews and I think they are essential for everyone, readers, authors, industry.
Honestly, if I had to lose followers because of my negative book review – I am prepared to lose every single of them because it is more important for me that my opinion is out there and no one should be silenced because of their opinion in that suppressive “avoidance and unfollowing threat” manner.

I prefer to have a few niches than just one as I like to write about different hobbies/interests I have. I also agree with the blogging everyday thing. I don’t know how people find the time to post daily. Great Post!

Thank you! I like to have different niches too since some days I want to write about makeup but then others I want to write about books.
I don’t know how people find the people to post every day too unless it is their job!

This is such genuine advice! I always worried that my posts were too long and thought that I should have every single social media account because of these blogging ‘rules’, but I guess it doesn’t really matter in the end. Not so long as you love what you are doing and the content is on point 😊

This was an excellent post!! I totally agree with what was said by you and some of those who answered your question on Twitter. It’s funny that you mention Facebook because I’ve tried to paste my link and they won’t even allow it and neither does IG cuz they are owned by Facebook anyways so… I only post once a week on Fridays and yeah I know I don’t get a ton of likes, comments are followers, but for me it is what it is and I don’t want to burn out like I have in the past.

Thank you!
That’s weird you can’t paste your link on Facebook or Instagram, but can you share your links on Twitter?
That’s good you only post on Fridays because when I was posting 3 times a week it was overwhelming & it can lead to burn out.

The advice about writing long posts is one I have been told often. I just don’t want to be bond to writing long posts because I think it would kill creativity. I also think some readers will find it overwhelming to read nothing but long posts!

Love this post! Although for SEO purposes, Google prefers posts which are longer than 300 words and are likely to rank them higher. Although it depends whether you care about SEO or what your blog / post is about! Having one niche is such a rubbish piece of advice!

I remember that from your ebook & I do tend to write 300+ word posts, but sometimes shorter posts are needed depending on the topic.
I agree! No one should force themselves to stick to only one niche especially if they have multiple topics they want to talk about on their blog!

Some awesome tips! The niche one in particular had me thinking. I love children’s books and fantasy and felt I had to choose one to blog about to fit in with a niche, but maybe I could do both? Will have to think about it! Thanks for the great post!

Thank you! I definitely think you can do both! Instead of having just a children’s book niche, you can have a “books” niche & cover all books you want to write about! You can categorize them in the menu of your blog like how I have the categories for “beauty” “books” and “lifestyle” on my blog

Favourite post about blogging this month!!! I agree on most of them and can relate to it. I don’t know how anyone can blog everyday, unless that is their full time job but I believe in posting a few high quality posts or evergreen post instead of random posts posted daily. Unless you consider your blog as a diary of your life then that’s a different story. Looking forward to your future posts.

Thank you so much! Yes I know one full-time blogger who posts every day, but she only writes 2-3 of her own posts a week while the others are sponsored posts. For everyone else who blogs as a hobby, it’s better to have a few high quality posts like you said!

I loved reading this! I agree to all the points mentioned. I, too, was told to just have one niche or to post everyday. There are still days that I don’t get a single view, but that is ok – I’m writing because I love it. Great post!xx

Thank you! I don’t know why having a single niche is recommended when no one should have to force themselves to write about only one topic or why posting everyday is recommended when there’s a ton of cons against it! I’m glad to hear you love writing!

I enjoyed reading this post, I have seen many posts on the best advice, but I hadn’t seen a post written about the worst advice. Plus I liked how you were able to then bring in many other bloggers into this too. Thank you for sharing this.

I don’t think I have anything to add, but I definitely think the advice to post every day is terrible! Unless you’re a full time blogger (and even then you might need to dedicate SOME of your time to promotion). It’s just unrealistic (unless it’s a challenge) and I think likely to burn you out. ❤

I agree! There’s no need to post every day & I heard from bloggers who did blogtober or blogmas challenges that they ended up having lower views since they were just churning out posts & not focusing on the quality!

That’s amazing you’ve been blogging for 9 years & that’s great you’ve found what makes you happy with you blogging! I definitely agree that posting every day & having a ton of followers doesn’t guarantee happiness!

I like that you’re taking a different approach with this post. I agree with you about all of these advices being bad for bloggers. Blogging everyday can get overwhelming and it’s hard to keep up at some point. It’s great that all of these bloggers are sharing these tips!

Ahh loved reading this, Karalee!!! I am so honored you included my advice too ❤ I learned so much from these other bloggers as well & found freedom in reading all these thoughts and ideas. Thank you tons for sharing!! xo

I can’t believe how many people think you need to post every day and be on social media constantly! Yes, those things can help your blog grow, but that isn’t what blogging is about! (at lease not for me) I love getting followers, but I am still blogging for me. If I were to post every day I would get so burned out.

This was such a great post! You’re so right in saying that not all the rules work for everyone! I actually started my blog and went self-hosted right away! I’ve about 2 1/2 years in and I don’t regret it at all, but I definitely understand why others would feel that way! Great post, and thank you so much for including me in it xxx

Thank you & I’m I could include your bad advice! That’s great you went self-hosted & are still blogging 2.5 years later! For bloggers that are just starting out & figuring out if blogging is for them, they shouldn’t right away even though it’s recommended all the time.

Blogging first and foremost should be FUN for a new blogger, trial and error is the best way to learn, and adventuring in the blogging community you will start to figure things out, which is part of the fun.

Excellent advice. Before I started blogging, I was reading as much as I could. I came across many of the “myth” statements you have. I mean, yeah, sometimes I wonder if almost doing my own thing is bad. In the end, if I don’t stick to my true voice, THAT’S the bad part.
Thanks for sharing and reminding us of what really matters.

Thanks, this is very reassuring. I have been followed by people who never seem to read my posts ( or perhaps just never like them!)and assume they just want a follow in return. You have to like both sides of blogging, the writing and the reading stuff you appreciate and enjoy. No ‘blind’ liking either!

I know you have asked that we share some ‘bad advice’ we’ve received but while I was reading along I could not help but nod to the points you mentioned. We’re on the same page here Karalee. Love these posts by you!